Beefy Boxes and Bandwidth Generously Provided by pair Networks
Perl: the Markov chain saw
 
PerlMonks  

Weird anomaly in brian_d_foy experience points

by eyepopslikeamosquito (Archbishop)
on Dec 11, 2010 at 11:32 UTC ( [id://876583]=monkdiscuss: print w/replies, xml ) Need Help??

If you check via The Wayback Machine, you'll see that brian_d_foy had experience points:

How can it be possible then, that today he is reported as having only 19315 experience points? Has the Perl Monks experience points database got corrupted in some bizarre way?

Replies are listed 'Best First'.
Re: Weird anomaly in brian_d_foy experience points
by Anonymous Monk on Dec 13, 2010 at 13:34 UTC
    brian here:

    I haven't really bothered to log in to Perlmonks since the password database was published. I think I changed my password, but either I can't remember it or it isn't what I think it should be. I don't get the email for the password reminder. The one in my keychain doesn't seem to work anymore.

    As for any worries about my well being, it is the weekend you know. Some of us don't actually use the interwebs all day every day, and someone finally managed to figure out someone like me has a well known and easy to find email address (although googling seemed a bit extreme).

    I'm not speculating on what happened, why it happened, and so on, but I didn't do anything on purpose to reduce my XP. I'm not terribly concerned about it either unless there's some new way to turn in-game money into real money. :)

      just wanna approve, this is no hoax, it's Brian speaking.

      I got an email from his official mailaddress with identical message.

      And - FWIW - I'm real. Me and one of the gods have an "Erdős 1" distance in RL! :)

      Cheers Rolf

      PS: Could one of the gods please - after fixing Brians account - reestablish the 98735 XPoints I lost in the last week? ;-)

        "PS: Could one of the gods please - after fixing Brians account - reestablish the 98735 XPoints I lost in the last week? ;-) "

        Yeah! In your dreams !

      Well, someone's using your account because each time I'm looking the "last time here" flag is to some low value : 19 minutes ago, 2 hours ago. So obviously one of the gods should do something about it.
        Maybe a complicated publicity plot from Brian, to get onion wide attention and prime time in perl medias? ¹

        And in some weeks he will announce his new "Post Modern Quantum Perl#" book and start the merchandising...

        ...

        Cheers Rolf ;-)

        PS: desperately waiting for the John Grisham depiction of these events...

        1) Who knows when the videos showing him and Paris Hilton will mysteriously leak to youtube...

Re: Weird anomaly in brian_d_foy experience points
by planetscape (Chancellor) on Dec 13, 2010 at 18:58 UTC

    Whatever prompted you to check up on this?

    HTH,

    planetscape

      I was idly browsing the Saints in our Book page a week or so ago and noticed there were no monks at all in the 19,000s. None. That was most unusual and caught my eye. At that time, I was in the high 18,000s (with Your Mother and his gang of four sneaking up on me from behind). When I finally scaled the 19,000 peak, I checked again, hoping to see myself, and myself alone, in this exalted 19,000 category. I was shattered when I saw that an interloper had got there before me, one brian_d_foy! Now, his many blockbuster nodes notwithstanding, I doubted that he could have got past Your Mother and his gang of four that quickly, so the only other possibility was that he had sneakily descended onto the 19,000 plateau. At that time, brian was still ahead of me, but has since dropped one behind me. Hmmm ... I hope I'm not a suspect now.

      Here's how it currently stands:

      ... 57 jdporter 20115 58 eyepopslikeamosquito 19123 59 brian_d_foy 18904 60 FunkyMonk 18756 61 toolic 18755 62 Your Mother 18716 63 wfsp 18340

      FunkyMonk and toolic are currently engaged in a gripping duel I see. Update: Twelve hours after writing this, I notice that toolic has just moved from one behind FunkyMonk to one ahead (18759 to 18758).

      Update: as at 24-Jan-2015 it is now: ... 22 toolic 39046 39 Your Mother 28788 40 eyepopslikeamosquito 28540 57 jdporter 23861 61 FunkyMonk 22652 73 wfsp 19164 74 brian_d_foy 19008 ... Update: as at 17-July-2020 it is now: ... 20 Your Mother 49364 23 toolic 46524 34 eyepopslikeamosquito 40267 42 FunkyMonk 34277 55 jdporter 28429 94 wfsp 19183 96 brian_d_foy 19055 ... Update: as at 1-June-2022 it is now: ... 20 Your Mother 52595 28 toolic 46968 30 eyepopslikeamosquito 46129 44 FunkyMonk 35328 51 jdporter 30464 97 wfsp 19188 98 brian_d_foy 19106 ... Update: as at 21-Aug-2023 it is now: ... 21 Your Mother 53484 27 eyepopslikeamosquito 50210 30 toolic 47122 42 FunkyMonk 35961 52 jdporter 30990 98 wfsp 19191 99 brian_d_foy 19145 ...

        Thanks for the explanation.

        I observe that if brian_d_foy's points were restored to the Jan 15 2008 level by godly fiat, he would then displace strat from slot 34. While not bearing strat any ill will, I hope that the contents of this thread provide adequate evidence that brian_d_foy's fall from grace was not of his own accord, and would consider restoring what is rightfully his.

        HTH,

        planetscape
        Hmmm, ... I hope I'm not a suspect now

        You're probably safe ... as long as jdporter's XP doesn't suddenly start diminishing.

        Cheers,
        Rob

        syphilis heads off to embark upon a systematic downvoting of jdporter's nodes ....
        ;-)
Re: Weird anomaly in brian_d_foy experience points (address)
by tye (Sage) on Dec 11, 2010 at 20:20 UTC

    If you are curious, you should probably just ask brian. If brian cares to ask for an investigation, then one of the gods might find time to look into it. Not that I'm convinced such would turn up much given the very wide time span involved.

    - tye        

      Clearly the gods need to disable brian d foy's account, at the very least, because someone is logging in as him and gnawing away at his XP. They should be able to figure out where this person is logging in from and take countermeasures, too. Such a person is a criminal, at least in the virtual state which is PerlMonks.

      What is the sound of Windows? Is it not the sound of a wall upon which people have smashed their heads... all the way through?

        The password of brian_d_foy's account has been changed. The e-mail appears to be correct so brian can reclaim the account by requesting a password reminder. I believe we currently have one web server that is failing to send e-mails so you have a 50% chance of the e-mail reminder working. We hope to have that fixed soon.

        - tye        

      > given the very wide time span involved.

      Hmm

      the OP wrote:

      >that today he is reported as having only 19315

      My last check was Experience: 18955

      It's thinkable that someone hacked his account...

      I'm sending him a /msg to clarify that it's not his own concept of mortification. :)

      Cheers Rolf

      Update: Hmm well maybe the hacker replies... xD

        His home node states that he rarely reads his PM messages and asks you to email him instead.

        For the record, his experience points are down to 18899 now -- as at Mon 13 December 2010 12:24 PM, Chicago time (I'm using Chicago time because that's where brian d foy lives, assuming he hasn't been kidnapped).

        The suspense is killing me.

        Update: Seems to have stabilised at 18920, as at Wed 15 December 2010 2:25 PM, Chicago time (with the account unused for 2 days).

Re: Weird anomaly in brian_d_foy experience points
by Anonymous Monk on Dec 11, 2010 at 11:37 UTC
    You can lose experience points in increments of 5 at any time of your own free will, heck, you can even voluntarily go into negative experience
      So you hypothesize that brian_d_foy "voluntarily" invoked his "own free will" more than 1,330 times to reduce his XP?

      Maybe he used PBP to program execution of the point-reduction mechanism? Or, less gracefully, did he do it in a C-style loop? Using Fortran? ADA?

      Even though some adepts have -- in the past, it is rumored -- acted to reduce their XP by large amounts, /me thinks eyepopslikeamosquito has a reasonable question.

        I think the vote fairy is bitching because of his other engagements ... ;-)

        Cheers Rolf

        PS: Who knows what a vengeful woman might do to his user image ...

        I answered the question how can it be possible
      Out of curiosity how do you do that? I can seem to be able to downvote myself :)
        Visit thepen, click the button, lose 5 xp
Re: Weird anomaly in brian_d_foy experience points
by Anonymous Monk on Dec 13, 2010 at 06:09 UTC
    I can't wait for someone to get to the bottom of this. The suspense is keeping me up at night.

      Now I'm getting worried. I hope he hasn't been kidnapped or something. Has anyone seen him lately?

        > Has anyone seen him lately?

        Why are you sure that he's a real life person? =)

        Cheers Rolf

        "Now I'm getting worried. I hope he hasn't been kidnapped or something. Has anyone seen him lately?"

        Hasn't he just passed you going downwards in Saints in our Book

Log In?
Username:
Password:

What's my password?
Create A New User
Domain Nodelet?
Node Status?
node history
Node Type: monkdiscuss [id://876583]
Approved by moritz
help
Chatterbox?
and the web crawler heard nothing...

How do I use this?Last hourOther CB clients
Other Users?
Others about the Monastery: (6)
As of 2024-03-19 09:09 GMT
Sections?
Information?
Find Nodes?
Leftovers?
    Voting Booth?

    No recent polls found